


After The Witching Hour: Hellbent Happily Ever After

by Aurora Cee (SC182)



Category: Hellbent (2004)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst with a Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Possessive Behavior, Post-Canon Fix-It, Romance, What-If
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-24
Updated: 2016-04-24
Packaged: 2018-06-02 07:50:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6558289
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SC182/pseuds/Aurora%20Cee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three ficlets that take place after Hellbent aka give Eddie and Jake a chance at a happy ending.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Morning After

**Author's Note:**

> Visual justification is [here](http://%5BIMG%5Dhttp://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e69/supercaptain182/eddiejakehellbenticonzicons_zpsvvkxxvhm.jpg%5B/IMG%5D),[here](http://%5BIMG%5Dhttp://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e69/supercaptain182/jakeiconzicons_zpstw07oamp.jpg%5B/IMG%5D), and [here](http://%5BIMG%5Dhttp://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e69/supercaptain182/eddiehellbenticonzicons_zps6rzwi3ef.jpg%5B/IMG%5D).
> 
> Written in 2007.
> 
> Property of the Here Network.

When he wakes up, the blinding intensity of sunlight makes him think twice about actually opening his eyes. His head hurts and his shoulder kills, there’s a steady throb there, and luckily for him, as he shifts his head across the pillow, Eddie is there. He’s asleep. But he’s seated comfortably, or uncomfortably as it may be in the chair, his curls are loose and upturned and he looks just so damn pretty. A few strands hang over the black eye patch and the pirate look is carried off even better.  
  
“You’re the cutest pirate I’ve ever seen.” Jake grunts.  
  
Eddie is out of the chair and by his side in a second. Questions fire out of his mouth like machine gun bullets, forcing Jake to roll his eyes and slide deeper into the pillows. “Dude, I’m fine.”  
  
“Really?” Eddie surprises Jake by finally taking a breath.  
  
“Yeah, I’m good.”  
  
A few days later, as the healthcare system would have it, Jake is released and Eddie is right there beside him. Jake’s sure Eddie should be doing something else, possibly worrying about his friends or being an emotional wreck or something; instead, Eddie worries about him.  
  
It’s kind of fun, a little cool, and definitely sexy.  
  
Outside the hospital, he’s happy to finally get a cigarette again. He lights up and turns to watch Eddie’s concerned gaze. “We could share a cab.” He says with his cigarette dangling from his lip.  
  
“Where you headed??” Eddie asks, while gazing out his window.  
  
Jake gives him an obvious look. “To your place. I need to pick up my bike.”  
  
Eddie looks at Jake’s arm inside the sling. “You really think you could control your bike like that?...I’m not saying that you can’t--” Eddie rambles, blushing ever so much under the scrutiny of Jake’s dark eyes.  
  
Jake leans over, the motion so fluid and fast, Eddie barely has a second to flinch back. “I can do a lot of things with just one arm.”  
  
They pull up to the apartment and Eddie remains inside the car. Jake walks over to his bike to inspect it. He turns around expecting to see Eddie on his heels, instead he sees the other man seating rigidly in the backseat, eyes completely averted from the sight of the apartment building.  
  
Seeing that Eddie isn’t getting out of the cab, Jake leans down into the window. “I hope you know this isn’t over. I don’t get stabbed in the shoulder for one night stands.”  
  
“Really?” Eddie asks.  
  
Quickly, Jake kisses Eddie’s lips and pulls back, leaving Eddie breathless. “I’m already good for a second date.”


	2. Morning After Mourning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The morning after when Eddie copes with the loss of his friends

In the meantime, Eddie finds that life really isn’t a fairy tale. There’s not immediate resolution to tragedy and the more people offer you comfort, the more it hurts. He should remember how it is after having three tragic experiences in life, but somehow memory never fully captures the sting of every pat on the back or a meaningful look brings.  
  
Strange, his dad hasn’t been gone that long and he’s already forgotten how it feels.  
  
Of course, there are funerals. All over West Hollywood, his friends and the two victims from the night before the Carnival are memorialized. So many fliers cover telephone poles and window fronts that Eddie decides to just stay home. He thanks God for small favors. At least, the police haven’t labeled it a bashing.  
  
Because sometimes, it’s good to recognize generally sociopathic behavior for what it is.  
  
Eddie holds up in two places: his sister’s place and the station. In neither place does he receive overwhelming outpourings of sympathy. If anything, he gets more respect. Before the officers in the station, his sergeant included, see him as an Academy wash-out and somewhat flamboyant office secretary. Now, despite the tragedy of losing his friends and having only one eye, he single-handedly managed to get the bad guy, save the hostage, and get his man. He’s automatically one of them. He’s his father’s son after all.  
  
Eddie smiles a bit more with each wink or cock of the head he receives. The Sarge brings him into the office and tries to offer him some time off. Of course, he doesn’t take it. When the Sarge looks at him above the rim of his glasses for a long moment, silently staring, his face immobile like rock, mouth thinned into a straight line; Eddie wants to reach up and cover his eyepatch with a hand.  
  
“Your dad would have been proud.” Finally, the Sarge says.  
  
Eddie smiles, a feels just a bit better. “Thanks, sir.”  
  
He goes back to his desk and feels stronger than he has in days. It will be so easy to just go back to his desk, immerse himself in paperwork and filing, and figure out ways to dodge community activists who want him front and center. He has no desire to be their living monument to the cause.  
  
Eddie sighs. Of course, life isn’t fair.  
  
The day isn’t halfway over and his head feels like it’s threatening to explode if he doesn’t sleep after days of catnaps and caffeine binges. His cell phone rings, the tune is something snappy and hip—probably something Chaz downloaded, and now he feels even worse, because it’s Toby’s mother calling and all he can do is slide his phone in a drawer and try to breathe through the many layers of survivor’s guilt.

* * *

  
“You need to get some sleep.” His sister says behind him.   
  
The album hit the floor. Pictures fan all over in a thousand different directions. Smiles and memories collide and the years of friendship twist and turn, making knot in Eddie's throat.  
  
“Shit.” He’s not going to cry. Promises are easier said than done. Then the first tear leaks out, saturating his eyepatch, a sensation he’d never forget.  
  
His sister scopes up the pictures first, stacking them in no certain order. “You just proved my point.”  
  
He rubs his face. “I know…it’s just--”  
  
She sits beside him. “You know this isn’t your fault.” Nina employs her resolute older sister tone with the hope that Eddie will believe her.  
  
Those big blue eyes turn her way. She can see the glassy sheen from tears and a lack of sleep. “Is that you telling me or is that a question?” He asks quietly, his eyes staring unwavering into hers. “Because I can tell you that I’m not so sure anymore.”  
  
Nina drapes her arms over his shoulders and Eddie leans back ever so slightly. Before their dad dies, she's there to beat up the bullies and check the closets. After their dad dies, she's there for everything else, even if that includes all the worst that can come to one person.  
  
Now, she bears his weight for him again, and she doesn’t mind at all. “Start believing it and get dressed. We have somewhere to be and the last thing Chaz, Toby, and Joey would want is for you to look like shit.”  
  
Right she is. Imagining the look of disapproval on Chaz’s face is enough to finally get Eddie off the couch.  


* * *

  
A week after the funeral, Eddie reaches a new step in the coping chain. He’s definitely not numb, nor is he in denial. Acceptance must have hit him the night all his best friend’s heads came crashing down on top of him.  
  
To guess where he is has to be somewhere around reeling. Their deaths have been accepted, denial is long gone; now, decisions must be made. How does he move on from the last ten years without his friends—brothers really?  
  
The apartment is still up in the air. He lets Toby’s mother in but can’t stay. Just the very idea of walking inside the living room makes him nauseated.  
  
He hasn’t seen Jake since. Eddie really doesn’t expect to see again. Does he?  
  
The eyepatch has been retired and his eyes are once again a matching set. He’s staying with his sister, where the memories are less traumatic.  
  
What more could he want?  
  
A long shadow is cast over his desk. It’s the Sarge. “Fitzgerald, you have a visitor.”  
  
Eddie glances around the precinct. His sister’s desk is empty and so is her partners. Wondering if she set something up is a fleeting and completely disappears when he walks into the empty lobby.  
  
He walks over to the receptionists, who while on a call points a long red polished nail to the door that leads into the parking lot.  
  
The door pushes open, immediately causing Eddie to shield his eyes. The sun beams down with a brightness that can best be described as set on one thousand. He stops at the edge of the walkway leading into the parking lot.  
  
What lies ahead is like every fantasy from age thirteen until now. The shiny chrome of the motorcycle twinkles in the afternoon sun. The rider leans against it with lazy posture, for all the world looking like a brunette James Dean: jeans, a white tee shirt with a pack of cigarettes clearly rolled inside. The last piece missing is the leather jacket which from where Eddie stands is slung over the seat.  
  
Yeah, Jake looks damn fine.  
  
“Hey.” Eddie wants to kick himself. Can’t he come up with something better?  
  
Jake takes a drag off his cigarette and flicks it away as his smoke rings float on in the wind. He’s the only person Eddie’s seen who can pull off annoyed and sexy as hell in one look.  
  
“I looked for you at the funeral. I figured you might need a ride or something.” Is that supposed to sound so dirty, because it really does, even if Jake hasn’t meant it that way?  
  
“I made my peace…it just didn’t feel right to do it with all those strangers around though.”  
  
“Yeah, I get you.” Jake stalks forward with hands buried in his pockets and his shoulders pointed towards the sky. His biceps seem chiseled into the surface of his skin. “You should have seen some of the looks I got when I asked about a really hot guy wearing an eyepatch. One guy thought I’d taken so much X that I thought I was at the Pirates premiere.”  
  
Eddie laughs lightly, ducking his head and most importantly, ducking Jake’s eyes. “Yeah, I got my replacement a while ago.”  
  
“I can see.”  
  
“Sorry I made you look like an ass.”  
  
“No prob--” Jake reaches into his back pocket. “It’s just that--” He trails off again, licking his lips. “What does a guy have to do to get a second date with you? I was already shot in the arm and stabbed in the shoulder…What I have to get shot in the leg too?”  
  
Eddie shakes his head. He’s blushing, probably fire engine red by now. “It’s not that. I thought…you wouldn’t want to go through that much trouble.”  
  
Jake’s in his face sudden. Lips inches away from Eddie’s, eyes burning hot and dark, he leans in, “Let me decide for myself, okay?”  
  
Jake hovers around his mouth and Eddie wonders if they’re going to kiss again, because Jake’s mouth is something he’d like to experience again. “Here.” Jake hands him a ziplock bag. Tiny red lollipops fill it nearly to the seal.  
  
“How’d you guess?” Eddie takes the bag, grinning.   
  
Jake shrugs nonchalantly. “I didn’t. I saw you with one before you came into the club.”  
  
The spark in Jake’s chocolate eyes makes Eddie wonder how much Jake has imagined him sucking on something, lollipops included.  
  
“Thanks.”  
  
“You’re welcome. You wanna get out of here?”  
  
Eddie considers it and asks Jake to wait. The sarge seems a little thrilled to get him out of the office. When he comes back out, Jake’s back in his leather jacket and his bike is purring like a big metal kitten. Eddie slips on the back. It feels like the best part of that night is back again.  
  
In a place that has to belong to Jake, Eddie finds himself more loose and needy than he’s ever been. Jake teases him, darting in and out for kisses, stopping just short where their breath mingles, while his fingers busily trace over Eddies sides, arms and up to his face.  
  
Jake grabs his chin and holds his eyes without saying a thing. He dives in, taking Eddie’s mouth in a hot languid kiss. His lips and tongue sucking, nipping, caressing Eddie’s far fuller ones.  
  
It’s there in Jake’s chocolate dark eyes that wildness that was present Halloween night, barely leashed as he teases and stalks Eddie into bed.  
  
Yeah, Eddie wants this. Feeling like prey is far better than feeling nothing at all. He’s never fucked on the first or second date for the matter. He’s always been a bit old fashion, but there’s something about Jake that makes him free and just a little slutty. Jake really likes when he resists, holds back like the shy almost virgin that he is; he likes working for it.  
  
Jake likes playing like this. His lips are busy with Eddie’s but his hands grip, grab and clutch Eddie’s ass as he grinds down. Sometimes, he slaps it just to break the monotony of kissing and stroking.  
  
It surprises Eddie just how much he likes having his ass smacked.  
  
Eddie is a little—a lot fucked up, and Jake is just a tad too possessive, so together they make up a screwed up vision of domestic bliss.


	3. Domestic Morning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eddie and Jake and regular morning out.

 

Eddie walks in with the last bag of groceries. His mind though is definitely elsewhere, stuck in between the triple chocolate chip ice cream and the guy in the produce section that shamelessly flirted with him, he completely misses Jake taking the bag from him and pushing him back against the wall.

Jake likes to play, but usually only after Eddie’s initiated it. The look in those deep chocolate eyes conveys everything except for Jake being in a playful mood. “You were flirting.” He grit between his teeth, growling.

Eddie shakes his head, his curls bouncing in agreement, and pushes against the pressure applied to his shoulders. “ I was not flirting. The guy wanted some help--”

“And you were helping him get a nice look at your ass.” Jake finishes for him. Since they’ve become comfortable with each other and the casual date has become casually staying over, and that has almost made it to the living together step, Eddie takes the good with the bad.

Jake radiates a butch appeal like most people wear a tan. It exudes out of every masculine pore attracting girls, guys, and those in between. So he’s become accustomed to the swarms of girls and guys always inventively throwing themselves at Jake.

It’s all innocent. Eddie knows Jake is with him for a reason or reasons that are only known to Jake.

“I would have known if he was checking out my ass. He just needed some help with that bag of charcoal.” Eddie argues when putting away the bread. 

Jake rolls his eyes sarcastically. “Yeah, he really needed your help. He looked like he could press 280.” Jake’s fingers curl into the material of Eddie’s cerulean blue sweater. “It may have been your ass he was looking at, but your eyes got his attention first.”

Jake knows how sensitive Eddie is about his eyes, so he’s built up his own protective streak when it comes to anyone finding them pretty. “So that’s why he wouldn’t make eye contact with me again!” Eddie mocks.

Rarely does Jake blush. When he does, all Eddie wants to do is kiss him until he’s breathless. “I didn’t do anything to him. I just let him know I don’t like it when other guys hit on my boyfriend.”

That’s somewhat of a mouthful for Jake to admit. He doesn’t do flowers and romance. Sometimes though being with Eddie really makes him want to.

There’s no fighting the smirk that pulls at his lips. Eddie advances on Jake, fingers twining in the thin straps of his black muscle tank. “I guess you’re right.” He sighs playfully. “It’s taken me all this time to get a boyfriend—a good one, I should add. What would I do without my fearless boyfriend to protect my honor.” Eddie says against Jake’s parted lips.

Cocking a brow, Jake licks his lips and pushes Eddie back against the counter. “That’s right. I’m doing this for your own good.

“My hero.” Eddie whispers. His lips brush against Jake’s, quickly absorbing the flavor of cigarettes and fruity bubble gum.

Jake evades another kiss, his head moving slightly out of stretching range. “That’s right. Who’s your man?” He postures.

Eddie gives him a peck on the lips. “You are.”

“Damn right.” Jake can only punctuate the fact with smack on the ass.

Jake and all his resounding butchness is just another reason why Eddie loves his man.

 


End file.
